The present invention deals with the problem of making polarization of light more readily perceptible by a human viewer, either in real time, or in viewing photographic images, such as video tape, film, or even still photographs.
Natural sunlight is not polarized. Thus, if one considers a given plane or planar field of view, and recognizes that light is propagated in waves, each wave following a line or axis traversing that planar field, then there will be as much natural sunlight generated in waves parallel to a first line as there is light generated in waves running perpendicular to that line.
Other sources of light, most notably indirect sources such as various surfaces which are reflecting natural sunlight, polarize the light to greater or lesser extents, and in different ways. This means that it is possible, considering the same planar field of view, to find a direction traversing that plane in which a maximum amount of the light reflected by such a source is generated, and it will be found that a minimum of the light reflected by that source is generated in a direction perpendicular thereto.
Information about the relative degrees and manners of light polarization, as among various objects in a scene, can potentially give much useful information about those objects. For example, if viewing the scene of an offshore oil spill from the air, it might not be possible to determine visually the exact location of the perimeter of an oil slick on water. However, if one could evaluate the polarization of light reflected from the various portions of the body of water being viewed, the size, location and shape of the slick could be more precisely determined, and this would be very useful in directing clean up efforts.
However, it is, as mentioned, virtually impossible for at least the majority of human beings to visually perceive polarization phenomena with the naked eye.